Oh, how times have changed: It is a re-hashed ‘most unattractive accents’ poll albeit in reverse. There were, as is par for the course, few surprises: The Welsh accent came out top, and that is no surprise as it certainly relaxed me after my recent broken wrist at BikePark Wales.
A survey of 1,500 folk ranked 15 accents from most to least relaxing with the Welsh beating the Cornish accent (I am married to a Cornish lass and when she’s not annoyed with me, it is a thing of beauty!), and the Yorkshire accent, which is a curveball as hearing terms such as ‘brew’ or ‘you great apeth’ doesn’t sound good in any dialect, but maybe that’s just me…
The survey then falls into a pit of incredulity whilst seeing the Scottish accent, very similar in aggression to that of our Northern Irish brethren, being ranked equal sixth for ‘relaxation’.
Geordie was eighth and the Norfolk accent 10th followed by the bottom four of Scouse which showed a huge 23% of people finding it relaxing and Brummie in 13th, which must be an all-time high for the drollest and most irritating accent of all.
The bottom two, showing bias toward us southerners were Cockney on 20% and Essex on 18%.
The survey originators, SpaSeekers, along with an expert in dialectology from the University of Sheffield, went one step further and produced a list of the world’s most relaxing accents.
I am not sure if they gave a choice of 10, which renders such polls irrelevant due to forcing people into choosing options they maybe wouldn’t, but the British accent is not listed whereas Chinese, in 10th, is usurped, surprisingly, by the rather unattractive, and harsh sounding, Germans in ninth place with 15%.
I can’t argue the Italians in number one as it is a relaxing accent although, as with Spanish, the relaxation element is completely diminished by many of the female contingent of Italia not pausing for breath between sentences or paragraphs, thus rending it, to an amateur ear like myself, as a noisy jumble of words which I will never be able to decipher.
As for me, my Mockney Hastings drawl which, I am fully aware often leaves others believing I am a bit ‘thick’ until I deploy the full force of my not instantly apparent genius, will continue to not trouble the most relaxing surveys, but I can live with that as long as I don’t have to listen to Scouse or Brummie every day in the meantime!
- Brett Ellis is a teacher.
